


Open My Heart and Let it Bleed Onto Yours

by thereweregiants



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Blackwatch Era, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Scent Kink, Sharing a Bed, it's not nontraditional exactly but there is some Phun with Pheromones, mild warning for the inherent dubcon of heatsex/rutsex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2020-01-01 04:43:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18328859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thereweregiants/pseuds/thereweregiants
Summary: It's not bad enough that Jesse is wrecked from a severe concussion or seemingly the entirety of Italy is out to get them, no. Of course Jesse has to have his hormones do their yearly thing when he's trapped in the mountains with his commander.There's no way this won't go wrong.Fucking Italy.





	Open My Heart and Let it Bleed Onto Yours

**Author's Note:**

> aw fuck yall I ABOed  
> supposed to be a short PWP but I got feelings n shit all over everything  
> I have evolved past the point of shame
> 
> title from TV on the Radio's [Wolf Like Me](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1-xRk6llh4) (original is Gabe's version, [Lera Lynn's cover](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwVX4cG6F9s) is Jesse's)  
> soundtrack to writing was the Bastion soundtrack (Slinger's Song is Jesse music and you won't convince me otherwise)

Jesse leans wearily back against the side of the van, letting his aching head rest for just a moment before the vibrations make him wince and try to straighten up.

“I told you not to lean back,” comes an annoyed and reassuringly familiar growl from behind him. A tense but careful hand pulls his head over until it rests against a broad shoulder. His temple isn’t injured, it’s the lump with a still-bleeding gash across it at the back of his skull that’s the issue. Jesse sighs as he nestles his head in closer against Gabe’s bicep.

“Don’t get too comfortable,” Gabe says warningly, but Jesse can hear the thread of concern underneath. What was supposed to be an easy mission had deteriorated fast, and while Moira and Genji had gotten out, Jesse and Gabe had been pinned down in a building until heavy pulse blasts brought it all down on their heads. Some type of EMP must have gone off at the same time - their coms aren’t working and their tablets are dead. Thankfully, both of them had mostly mechanical guns so they could get out shooting.

They’d stumbled through fields until Gabe had flagged down a passing farmer, flashing some type of ID and explaining in semi-coherent Italian that they needed a ride. The farmer had helped them into his van, and Jesse just hopes that the scent of blood and cordite covers Gabe’s own weirdness. The last thing they need is some civilian freaking out at how he has no scent.

Huh. That’s a thing. Jesse lets his head loll to the side. “How d’you deal with...regular people?” he asks, trying not to slur his words. He knows that Gabe interacts with the public and people outside of Blackwatch - he’s seen him accepting medals himself. So how does everyone not freak out about not being able to identify him? Jesse knows that when he looked at the man for the first time and his eyes said ‘alpha’ but his nose said there was no one there, he’d nearly had a panic attack.

“What do you mean...god damnit, kid,” Gabe says with half his attention, up until Jesse nearly brains himself on the van’s wall as they go over a pothole and he has to grab for him. He wraps a rough arm around Jesse’s shoulders, shoving his face into the spot on his shoulder right between the chest armor strap and the shoulder caps. Maybe he doesn’t have any pheromones, but Gabe still smells nice to Jesse. Right now it’s mostly sweat and gunpowder and ozone, but none of those are necessarily bad, especially not when blended in with the nearly faded tang of aftershave and the trace of tobacco that always hangs around Gabe even though Jesse has never seen him smoke.

Jesse mumbles incoherently into Gabe’s shoulder until he gets a hand slapped over his mouth, accompanied by a “Shut the fuck up, we don’t know if the farmer speaks English”. Jesse lets himself drift off, Gabe’s increasingly frantic hisses trying to get his attention no match for the throbbing of his head.

-x-x-x-x-x-

Pain. Light. Jesse lets his eyes fall shut after just a moment, but squints them back open as soon as he feels able. Thatched roof, stone walls, flickering light that says fire so there likely isn’t much electricity. Soft clinking sounds that are comfortingly domestic, coming from not too far away. He takes a deep breath and can’t smell much other than his own pain and anxiety - with a background of a tinge of blood and too-long worn clothing - but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything in Blackwatch.

Sure enough, he turns his head carefully to see Gabe at a small stove, stirring something in a pot.

“Food?”

“You gonna keep it down this time?” Gabe replies without turning around.

Jesse licks his lips, can taste the sourness of vomit in the back of his throat. “Sorry.”

Gabe pours something into a bowl and brings it over, setting it down on the small table next to the bed. Jesse embarrassingly needs his help to sit up, but thankfully is able to feed himself. The familiar taste of the standard issue dried soup packs is oddly homey.

“Where are we?”

“Safe house. Near the base of Mount Etna.”

“Mount Et- when the fuck did we get to Sicily?”

“Three days ago.” Gabe’s voice is its usual even tone, but Jesse can see the dark skin under his eyes, see the tightness of his mouth. “The farmer got us from Cosenza down to Giarre, I knew there was a house somewhere near the mountain so I liberated an ATV to get us here.”

“Liberated.”

“So to speak.”

“How’s everyone else? Get out okay?”

Gabe shrugs. “Dunno. Everything got knocked out by the EMP, and you weren’t doing well.”

“How not well?”

Another shrug.

“Gabe.”

“Bad enough. Your pupils were off, you kept vomiting, you would come to but half the time you didn’t know who you were, let alone me. You should have been in a hospital days ago, but this is fucking Italy.”

Fucking Italy, indeed. The whole country seemed to be infiltrated by Talon, and one bad encounter with the _polizia_ proved that Gabe’s picture must be floating around somewhere.

“I’m awake now. You should see if you can charge shit up, or steal a tablet or somethin’.”

Gabe’s eyebrows lower. “You’re awake but I can smell your pain. I’m not going until you’re coherent for twelve hours at least.”

“Fine. Then...get some sleep, boss. You look like shit.” Jesse is lying in the middle of the small bed, and the only other furniture in the place is the nightstand, a small table, and the chair that belonged to it that Gabe had dragged over next to the bed. If Gabe had slept at all recently, it wasn’t in comfort. Jesse carefully moves over, making as much room as he can. “C’mon, I got a concussion, not cooties.”

Gabe rolls his eyes, but toes off his shoes and starts to lower himself down. They both freeze as the bed creaks worryingly - it likely wasn’t built to handle four hundred pounds of soldier, but there they are. Gabe finishes laying down carefully, and pokes at Jesse’s shoulder.

“Turn around, I want to look at those stitches.”

“What’d you use to stitch me up?”

“Dental floss.”

“So my head’s minty fresh.”

Blunt fingers probe at the back of Jesse’s head. It hurts, but nothing like it had before. “Doesn’t look infected, at least. Get some sleep, depending on how you are we’ll be out of here tomorrow or the next day.”

Jesse pauses in flipping back over, as a rill of anxiety runs through him. “What’s the date?”

“April 28th. Why?”

Shit. They were cutting it close. “...no reason.” He closes his eyes.

“Jesse.” It’d be so much easier to ignore him if he wasn’t all of six inches away.

He sighs. “It’d be on your schedule, except we’ve been off grid for so long.”

A moment of stillness, then breath warms his arm as Gabe sighs himself. “Fuck, I forgot. When’s it start?”

“First of May. Boss…”

“We’ll deal with it, one way or another. Go to sleep.”

Easy for him to say, he isn’t the one due to go into his yearly rut in a few days in a country that has a grudge against them without anyone but his commander around.

Hell.

-x-x-x-x-x-

Warmth. Warmth right in front of him, muscle that’s moving as it breathes. Jesse takes a deep breath but frowns as he doesn’t get the hit of omega pheromones that his body craves. But in front of him is that warmth, and that’s good enough. He slides an arm around a narrow waist, wraps a leg around a thigh and pulls back so he can slide himself up the cleft of the well-shaped ass he can feel right in front of him. He feels the body in front of him sigh and arch back into it for one glorious moment, before stilling and pulling away slightly. Jesse tries to grind closer, into the heat and soothing smell of musky sweat and gun oil.

“Jesse.”

“Mmm.”

“Jesse, you’re asleep.”

He just slips his hand underneath the shirt, running it up a muscled stomach that tenses up. No, that isn’t right. They should be enjoying this, Jesse certainly is.

The warmth moves, and a cool hand gently checks the back of his head, then presses to his forehead. “Hell. Your rut arrived early.”

Jesse squeezes forward, burying his face in - oh the warmth was Gabe, maybe he should pay attention to that - the throat in front of him. “Mmm. Don’ move…”

“Jesse, you’re not going to get anything out of that,” Gabe said as Jesse rubs his face on his neck, trying to get Gabe’s scent. “I don’t smell like anything.”

“Yeah y’do. S’nice. Not pheros but still nice.”

A pause. “Okay. I guess.” A sharp inhale as Jesse tries to roll over on top of him. “Jesse, no. You’re not going to fuck me.”

Jesse mumbles something about need, needing to be buried in a warm body, needing to give his knot, needing to come, needing to come with Gabe, now, now now NOW -

“Okay, okay. Hold on.” A quick movement and Gabe is pinning Jesse down, not letting him move. He can’t stop his body though, can’t stop the slow roll of his hips, the licking of his lips, the arching of his neck so Gabe can see how good he’ll be, how good of an alpha he’ll be for...him… but Gabe was _Gabe_. His commander, not some omega to need protecting. Not that he thinks omegas need protecting, generally - he dares anyone to say that to Genji or Ana or Reinhardt’s face and walk away with all limbs attached - but right now his higher brain functions have abandoned him in favor of need and want and oh god he needs to fuck _something_.

“Jesse. _Jesse_.” Gabe moves to hold both of his wrists with one hand so he can slap his face gently with the other. It startles Jesse for a moment, before he melts back into the sheets, murmuring _do that again_ , causing Gabe to sigh and roll his eyes. “Have you ever been through a rut alone before?”

Jesse shakes his head slowly, trying to focus on something other than his dick trapped by his pants. “Genj ‘n I help each other out. Pick up someone in a bar or whatever ‘f we can’t.”

“Great,” Gabe mutters. “Okay, come on.” Jesse loses track of things for a minute, and when he blinks his eyes open, he’s in a new position. Gabe is sitting up in the bed, leaning back against the headboard. Jesse is tucked between his legs and leaning back against his chest, rhythmically digging his fingers into Gabe’s thighs in a way that had to be painful. “S’rry,” he slurs out as he pulls his hands away.

“It’s okay, I can take it. Jesse. Jesse? Look at me, I need your attention.” If it was literally anyone but Gabe using his commander voice it likely wouldn’t have worked, but Jesse pries his lids open and turns his head, trying to meet Gabe’s eyes through the buzzing that’s taking over all his senses.

“You don’t really have a choice here and I’m sorry about that. Are you okay with me...helping you through things?” He sounds awkward, and in a moment of lucidity Jesse feels a wave of guilt prickle inside him for what he was putting Gabe through.

“ ‘M sorry. Shouldn’t have to do this.”

He can feel the shrug from behind him. “We do what we have to in order to survive.” If Blackwatch had a motto, that would probably be it. “Just...let me know if I do anything you don’t want.”

Now there was a useless statement. Jesse would have been ecstatic to be in Gabe’s bed on a normal day - he’d been harboring quiet and useless feelings for the man for years. But given he was Jesse’s commander and an alpha to boot - Jesse had no problems sleeping with someone of his own dynamic, but he knew he was one of the very few. As friendly as society had become to various sexualities, fucking outside of traditional dynamics was still very much frowned upon. Jesse didn’t understand why, but then he’d rarely come across a taboo that he wasn’t willing to trample. What people seemed to not have discovered was how fucking amazing it was to be fucked by an alpha, as an alpha. All that alpha come had to be produced somewhere, and in alphas it was an enlarged prostate that felt amazing when hit by someone’s knot.

But here they were, in the middle of the goddamn mountains with Jesse half out of his mind with hormones and Gabe having to help him through it. Rut sex was always good, but also always left Jesse feeling empty afterwards. It was depressing to realize he’d now associate that emptiness with Gabe, too.

Jesse had managed to distract himself with thinking, laying quietly in Gabe’s arms. A cramp goes through his lower guts and he gasps in pain, clutching at Gabe’s thigh once more. He can’t put it off any longer. Fire is licking through his veins and everything starts to fuzz out in favor of needing to fuck something, anything.

“Jesse? I’m going to...oh hell, just tell me if it hurts,” Gabe’s voice is rough and worried in his ear. None of it matters, though, because there’s a hand moving down his chest, pressing against the front of his pants, firmly rubbing up and down. Jesse’s whole body relaxes, the pain subsiding at the pressure. His pants are wet from how much he’s been leaking, and the sodden fabric against his cock isn’t comfortable.

He fumbles uselessly at his flies for a minute before Gabe bats his hands away, grumbling something about doing everything himself. Jesse can’t quite stop the whimper that comes out as the cool air of the room hits his burning skin. He shifts around, noticing in the back of his brain that at some point he’d lost - or more likely, Gabe had removed - his shirt. Gabe shushes him, holding him back against him with a firm arm as his other hand wraps around his painfully swollen cock. He’d put it off for too long - his knot pops immediately, inflating and moving up into Gabe’s hand in just a moment.

Jesse moans helplessly, hips bucking up as Gabe squeezes him with just the right pressure. Even though it’s just a hand and not anyone’s body, it’s enough. It takes just half a minute of stroking before Jesse’s back tightens and he starts coming, coating his chest and Gabe’s hand with steady pulses. Jesse zones out for a while, his world reduced to the supportive hand wrapped around him, the solid body behind him, and the rumbles as Gabe murmurs words of comfort that are too low to make out into the side of his head.

Blinking back to the real world, a damp cloth wipes over his chest. “You need a shower.”

Thank god there’s always a bit of clarity between the waves. “Can’t actually recall the last time I was clean.”

“I’m well aware.”

Jesse gives a halfhearted glare, but it’s hard to insult him back when he’d just helped get Jesse off and was now cleaning him up. “There’s a shower in here?”

“Outside. Cold, but functional.” A cocked eyebrow. “Could only help you, in any event.”

“Very funny.” Jesse sits up, gripping the edge of the bed for a minute when dizziness hits him. Whether it was from the rut or the concussion was anyone’s guess.

“How long does it usually last for you?”

“ ‘Bout a day, I’m pretty quick. Though it hit early this time…”

“Probably the head injury. Concussions in the right place can screw things up, I’ve seen it before.”

Jesse levers himself up and Gabe holds out a bundle of clothing. “Clothes?”

He doesn’t take them. “I know it’s a lot to ask with everythin’ else you’re doin’ for me, but could...could I have some of yours?”

Gabe frowns. “Jesse, you know that - “

“I know, but. It just. It still helps.” He didn’t want to admit that his attraction helped tone things down, that even the faint smell of Gabe’s aftershave and skin and sweat was enough to keep him from going as uncontrollable as he would be, were he completely on his own.

Gabe looks at him for a long moment, before rummaging in his bag and handing him a shirt and pants. “Shower’s through that door. You need help?”

“Nah, though if there was some food around somewhere I wouldn’t complain.”

“Needy, needy…” Jesse smiles at Gabe’s muttering as he goes outside. It isn’t nearly as cold as it could be, but the water itself is chill and has the faint earthy smell of being from a ground well. Being in air that didn’t smell of himself and his own hormones helps clear his head. This only made room for embarrassment to move in, and it takes a lot for Jesse to gather up the courage to go back inside.

He hesitantly steps in, only to have Gabe kick the chair out for him with a foot. He’s perched on the edge of the bed, shoveling oatmeal in his mouth. “Eat.”

It already has honey spooned on top, and the small gesture of thoughtfulness makes Jesse’s throat thick. Goddamn hormones, making him feel all wobbly over bee vomit. Jesus Christ.

They eat in silence - not exactly companionable, not exactly awkward. This didn’t have to be a big deal, for all Jesse knows Gabe has helped other agents through ruts or heats, it likely wasn’t an unusual situation. The idea of Gabe with anyone else like this, though...Jesse could feel himself stiffening in his pants out of possessiveness, and firmly tells his body to cut it out.

“Will you be okay for awhile? Was going to grab a shower myself.”

“Yeah. Might try and get some sleep.” Jesse collects their bowls and puts them in the sink to soak and as Gabe gathers his things to shower, Jesse gets in bed. He means to talk to Gabe after he finishes, but he drifts off quickly, face buried in his shirt that smells like Gabe.

-x-x-x-x-x-

Jesse fumbles in front of him sleepily. There’s fabric, and there should be skin. He knows there’s skin underneath, somewhere...ah, there it is. He grinds himself mindlessly forward against it, over and over, until his precome slicks the flesh and makes the ride smoother.

“You need me to do anything?” comes a tired voice from next to him.

He blinks his eyes open. Gabe is on his back, and Jesse is rutting against his side where his shirt had rucked up. “Take your shirt off,” he gasps. “Cleaner.” Not to mention more skin for him to touch, to splay himself against.

Gabe pulls the shirt off, tossing it somewhere in the dimness. Now Jesse has a visual to get him off as well, a muscled chest lightly dusted with hair and heavily marked with scars laid out before him.

“C’n you, just...yeah, right there,” Jesse shoves Gabe’s arm up until he can bury his head in the pit underneath where his scent is thickest, grabbing hard onto his waist as he knots against the cut of his hip.

Gabe eventually lowers his arm, pushing at Jesse’s head until it’s tucked under his arm. “You’re weird, kid.”

“ ‘M not the one that doesn’t smell, boss.” Jesse is in that odd time at the end when his dick is still spurting, but his head is starting to clear. “Why don’t you, anyways?”

“You’re really asking me that when you’re coming all over me.”

“Almost done. Not like either one of us is goin’ anywhere.” Knotting in someone could be easily an hour, but without a body clamped around him it’ll be less than ten minutes. The downside is that it’s not nearly as good, doesn’t get rid of the pain that pheromones would normally wash away.

A sigh, and Jesse almost misses what Gabe says in favor of watching the thick streaks of white drip down across his chest. “SEP shit, which I’m sure you guessed. They wanted to make us untrackable, figured it’d be pointless to have super soldiers that you could scent out. Made our own noses and phero detection better, ironically. Also stopped heats and ruts, for fear of us ending up in situations like this.”

Jesse has stopped coming, finally, now he just feels sticky and guilty. “Sorry, again.”

“Next time you say that you get hit, head injury or not. You can’t control your body, kid.”

“Still, though.”

“I know.”

Jesse laughs a bit, unexpectedly. “No you don’t, boss.”

An elbow to his side. “I did exist before the program, ingrate.”

Jesse rolls over, stands on wobbly legs. He grabs a towel draped over the back of the chair to dry after their showers and hands it to Gabe to wipe himself off.

“Eat a protein bar, then come back to bed. You need the calories to heal.” Jesse frowns but obeys, knowing he’s right. Usually Genji brought over bags of easily unwrapped food that didn’t need to be cooked during his rut, and Jesse did the same for Genji during his heats. He’d never really appreciated the comfort of that before, nor of a bed that could comfortably fit two men with broad shoulders.

Jesse gets back into bed, already feeling like he’s moving through molasses. He lets Gabe arrange his limbs until they can both fit without an arm or leg hanging off the side, and subsides into exhausted sleep before he can thank him.

-x-x-x-x-x-

Jesse wants to come. He wants to come so badly that tears are leaking from the corners of his eyes, that pained whimpers keep coming from his mouth even as he tries to bite his lips shut. One hand strokes his hair as another wraps around his cock, but he keeps cycling between burning heat and burning cold and it isn’t enough, it isn’t _enough_ -

“Hey. Kid, come on, come back to me. It’s been two hours and this isn’t working. Jesse? Jesse, what do you need me to do?” Gabe’s voice is calm, and the tone helps cut through the static in Jesse’s head. It feels like forever before he can wet his lips enough to form words.

“Fuck me.”

Jesse can feel the frown, where his face is pressed close to Gabe’s. “Not sure if you noticed, but you’re an alpha. Fucking you isn’t -”

“Helps. Done it before. Went through it with ‘nother alpha.”

A deep sigh, and before Gabe can say anything -

“ ‘m sorry. Know you don’t wanna.”

“Stop goddamn apologizing. Not going to kill me to fuck you, not if it stops the pain.” Despite the rough words, Gabe’s hand is gentle on his head, stroking carefully as Jesse shoves his face into the hollow of his collarbone, trying to scent something that isn’t his own lust and failing.

“I don’t have anything with me. I don’t suppose you do?”

“Last cartridge on th’ left, next to th’ flashbangs.”

“Of course you would. Hold on, I’ll just be a minute.” Jesse can’t help the sound that comes out as Gabe pulls away to find Jesse’s gun belt, and he honestly can’t tell if it hurts more to lose the hand on his hair or the one on his dick. He wraps a hand around himself and jacks off frantically but it isn’t the same, isn’t enough.

Warm hands turn him over carefully - “On your side, just like that, good” - and pull his leg up. A faint thread of thought trailing through Jesse’s brain makes him wonder if Gabe _could_ fuck him, if he was attracted to him at all, but it vanishes in the relief of lube-wet blunt fingers working their way into him.

Jesse barely notices as he’s stretched because it still isn’t quite -

Oh.

_There._

Jesse groans in relief as something much bigger than fingers presses against his swollen prostate as Gabe slides all the way inside of him. He lets his head fall back, tucking his face into the stubbled curve below Gabe’s jawbone.

“You good?”

Jesse grabs his hand, fumbles it around his cock, then shoves back with his hips. There’s a satisfying grunt from Gabe, and Jesse growls into his ear - “Now _fuck_ me.”

A rhythm develops between Gabe’s hips and hand, working around how Jesse can’t do much other than lay there and writhe around. Gabe’s cock scraping inside of him finally hits what the past few hours couldn’t, and Jesse starts coming across the sheets. He can’t help it as he tightens convulsively around Gabe, drawing a soft “Jesus _Christ_ , kid” before he thrusts harder.

The last thing Jesse remembers before blacking out is Gabe biting into his shoulder as he comes inside him.

-x-x-x-x-x-

“ -verything okay? You’re not usually incommunicado that long.”

“It’s all fine, Jack. Relatively. Talon is goddamn everywhere here, and they have at least my picture and know who I am. I don’t know how, but we had a run in with the state police that blew our cover.”

“That’s what took you out?”

“Yeah. Had to run, holed up in a building that they took down around us. McCree was injured pretty bad, should’ve had a hospital but I didn’t want to take the chance someone would tag him too. He’s stabilized now, enough that I was able to go out and snag a solar panel from a neighboring farm to recharge.”

“Okay. Fio’s on track to pick you up in a few hours, keep your com on. Take the rest of the day, we’ll debrief tomorrow.”

“All right. Reyes out.”

Jesse raises his head up. “We’re goin’ home?”

“Yep. You cooled down early this morning, rut finally broke. Took the ATV and got a solar panel to charge us up. Should be out of here soon.”

“Not that this hasn’t been fun, but I’m ready to see the back of this country for a while.”

Gabe stands and stretches, his back popping. “You and me both. Though we’re due to go to Rome in a few months, look at the new facility.”

Jesse makes a face - god, he’s sick of this country - but nods. They spend a while returning the safehouse to as good condition as they can: the sheets have to be thrown out, but after some cleaning and a shower apiece, it looks relatively okay. They hop on the stolen ATV, making it to a clear field just in time for Fio in the Blackwatch Orca to show.

Gabe and Jesse sit across from each other in the hold, Gabe tapping away at the messages that have piled up as Jesse worries at the edge of his hat with a chipped fingernail. As easily as Gabe had gone along with everything...things have changed between them. Jesse won’t soon be able to forget the feeling of Gabe inside of him, the sound of the soft reassurances he never thought the gruff man would be capable of making in his ear, the taste of Gabe’s sweat on a desperate tongue. The smell - that goddamn smell that wasn’t pheromones but just pure _Gabe_.

“Gabe, I - ” He stops, unsure of how to finish the sentence. The sound of typing pauses.

“We can’t control what our bodies do.” Gabe sounds almost melancholy as he quietly speaks. “Don’t make more of it than it was.”

 _But what if I want to?_ Jesse’s traitorous brain can’t stop from asking. He shifts in his seat - hips sore, the bite mark on his shoulder throbbing.

-x-x-x-x-x-

The first time is a reaction.

They race through the maze-like streets of Amsterdam, first in pursuit of an omnic holding a valuable data stick, then pursued themselves by the omnic’s Null Sector friends along the canals at a speed that would have made Jesse’s old instructors proud.

Gabe and Jesse are in sweat-soaked tuxedos, Gabe is missing his jacket and Jesse’s sleeve has a bullet hole through it. He thinks the dampness he feels is sweat and not blood, but they’re moving too fast for him to check. They dodge shots for block after block, the sound of gunfire finally dying away as they work their way into a run-down industrial area. Ducking into a half-demolished building, they plaster themselves to a wall, barely breathing as they wait for any signs of pursuit.

Life affirmation is an odd thing. One second they’re looking at each other, taking in Gabe’s sweat-soaked hair and Jesse’s crooked bowtie and laughing their heads off, the next they’re slammed up against a wall shoving their bodies into each other.

Jesse isn’t sure who moved first, but knows he doesn’t care. He has Gabe’s smell back in his nose, Gabe’s big hands wrapped around his hips, Gabe’s breath hot on his neck. He’s high on adrenaline, and the shame he should be feeling at grinding up against his commander without the excuse of rut this time never appears. With Gabe’s face buried in his throat and Jesse’s hands clenched in a ruined silk tuxedo shirt, he just can’t find it in him to care.

It takes an embarrassingly short time for Jesse to come with a gasp, but Gabe follows right after with a grunt and his mouth wet against Jesse’s collarbone. Their breaths slow as they come down from it, mentally returning to themselves and realizing what happened. Just as Jesse starts to wonder if he should use his pocket square to clean up the mess in his pants - christ, he wasn’t this bad even as a teenager - there’s the soft zip of pulse fire outside and Gabe falls into a defensive crouch as Jesse’s hands move to reload his gun without conscious thought.

They fight their way out and in the chaos of turning over the evidence and then debriefing, they never get a chance to talk about it. Jesse isn’t sure if he wants to.

-x-x-x-x-x-

The second time is a comfort.

They’re somewhere in eastern Kazakhstan, though Gabe is fiddling with the GPS and thinks they might have crossed a country border - whether it was China or Russia is anyone’s guess. All Jesse knows is that they’re in a cave by an iced-over lake, and he’d normally be bitching about the cold but at least it’s keeping down the smell from the dead bodies.

Shahadi is outside, too. Jesse wanted to bring her in, but Gabe talked him down from it. It’s not like she’s feeling the cold any more.

Moira and Genji are nice and warm at the safe house a hundred miles away. They’d split up to investigate the two warm spots on their radar that might indicate the rogue omnic factories they’d been looking for. Moira and Genji had found a tiny village of four houses and a barn while Jesse, Gabe and Shahadi had found a battle.

Whoever programmed the omnics did well - the first thing they did was take out the shuttle and the pilot. Jesse didn’t even get a chance to get unstrapped from his seat before Shahadi was dangling in her restraints, blood dripping onto the console. There was just enough time to grab the cold weather go bags before they were running and shooting, running and shooting.

They don’t get them all, although Jesse throws a couple of pulse grenades that take half the building down. Gabe has an EMP tucked away but it would take out their own equipment too and without a shuttle or pilot, a hundred miles away from civilization in the Central Asian winter, it would be suicide.

Outrunning omnics in this weather at least is doable - the viscous fluids in their limbs are sluggish in the cold. That’s why they send their humans after them.

Jesse and Gabe make a stand in a small cave not far from the shuttle, taking down fighter after fighter as the sun drops below the horizon and brings the temperature with it. Eventually the only people still breathing are the Blackwatch agents, though Jesse has some kind of injury to his arm that he’ll have to get undressed to see and Gabe took a slash to the face.

They stumble inside, Gabe starting a fire as Jesse unpacks the bags and sees what they have. An air mattress, which will be good for getting them off of the freezing ground. Various Mylar blankets that accompany a first aid kit. A tightly packed cooking kit, coffee and dried soup and half-frozen protein bars. Jesse wordlessly tosses it to Gabe, who catches it and gets a pot of coffee and a kettle of boiling water started.

It’s above freezing in the cave, finally, enough for Jesse to strip his layers down and see the damage. A pulse blast clipped his upper left arm. It missed the major muscles, thank god, but there’s still a nasty cauterized gouge taken out that’ll scar badly. Gabe uses the boiling water to clean him up, putting in a few stitches at the edge where it didn’t burn shut before taping him up with gauze. Jesse swallows down a general antibiotic before cleaning up Gabe’s face. The skin over his left cheekbone is split, blood still trickling out like sluggish tears.

It occurs to Jesse as he pinches the skin together to adhere the butterfly stitches that he’d always assumed Gabe’s facial scars were from a single incident. Maybe instead it was just this - wound after wound, battle after battle adding up over the years to make up the topography of his face.

Jesse inflates the air mattress as Gabe dishes up the food. For decades afterwards, Jesse will always associate lentil soup and vitamin-supplemented chocolate bars with his worst days in Blackwatch, his brain supplying an aftertaste of blood and salt and stress.

They eat, bank the fire just a bit, and lay down on the mattress wrapped in emergency blankets and every layer they can locate. Jesse stares up at the roof of the cave, the flickering firelight against stone. It reminds him too much of the fires from last week, of the Oslo facility blowing up and taking so many agents with it. It was just like this, in fact, fire against the Norwegian snow, the same scents of panic pheromones and burned flesh. They weren’t there when it happened, but their team came in to help find bodies and deal with the smaller fires that kept springing up.

And then now. More bodies, more blood. Shahadi slowly freezing solid in her pilot’s seat.

Breaking the silence for the first time since the fight: “Stop thinking so loud. You’re keeping me up.”

Jesse doesn’t reply. Gabe turns over, Jesse can feel his eyes on his face. “We do what we can, large or small. She knew what she signed up for, just like you.”

He didn’t, though. He didn’t know when he was seventeen and reckless, high on being a gang leader with fresh ink on his arm and old blood on his hands, that he would be choosing between prison and this. That he would be choosing to make friends that could die at any moment, that he would be surrounded by terrifyingly smart and motivated people that somehow thought he was one of them. That he’d be turned into what he’s afraid might be the best version of himself. That he’s afraid that it still might not be enough.

Jesse rolls over. They’re close, now, foreheads practically against each other. He’s too tired, physically and emotionally, to consider anything like risk so he moves that half inch forward, resting his head against Gabe’s.

Neither of them ask out loud, there’s just a hand on a hip and another on a jaw and their connected heads moving in a slight nod. Clothing is moved aside, moved on top of them for extra layers of protection against the cold and the world. Everything is just chill hands and hot breath on each other’s faces, a small human comfort in a vast wilderness.

Gabe comes first, his hand stilling on Jesse’s cock as he closes his eyes and breathes raggedly. Jesse has a hand wrapped around the side of Gabe’s neck as his other strokes him through it and he wants to lean forward those few inches to kiss him, but isn’t sure if that’s something they can do. If it’s something they should do.

Jesse pulls his hand out and wipes it on his bloodstained shirt - it’s not like anyone will notice. He breathes carefully as Gabe’s hand picks up the pace once more, and the sense memory of Gabe pulling at him in the same steady rhythm during his rut is what makes his hips stutter and spill over Gabe’s wrist.

Gabe tucks him back into his pants, wiping his own hand off on Jesse’s shirt to a murmured sound of protest. He rolls his eyes and pulls the layered blankets and jackets higher, tucking the soft weight around them. Jesse is pulled close, and his eyes slide shut as he takes in the scent in the space their bodies occupy. Blood and the medicinal sting of ointment and the roast pork that he knows is his own arm, below that his own pain and exhaustion and anxiety and satiation, and finally the base notes of his own pheromones and...Gabe. They don’t mix like they should, but it’s almost there. Almost real.

Jesse listens to the crackle of the fire and Gabe’s deepening breaths, and wonders what the hell they’re doing.

-x-x-x-x-x-

The third time is a choice.

There’s nothing in particular going on. They’ve had a quiet week, no missions that take them off base. Jesse spends his mornings instructing trainees in various firearms and spends his afternoons training. At night he and Genji have been working their way through Kurosawa’s oeuvre, and he’s been reading some book on troop movements that Ana gave him that despite the subject matter is almost annoyingly interesting.

And he wakes up at dawn and thinks of Gabe.

Not as his commander, but as the man who he’s been with three times now, as the man he now wants to know more about as a person and not a colleague.

And he goes to bed at night and thinks of Gabe.

That’s not normal, right? It was just a couple of hookups, that’s all.

Somehow Jesse finds himself walking past Gabe’s office door, past the hallway to his quarters more and more often. He finally knocks on his door late one night. Gabe opens it, in soft clothing that clings to him, that makes Jesse want to pull it off of him. After a pause that goes on just a few seconds too long, Jesse loses his nerve and asks if he wants to watch _Throne of Blood_ with them. Gabe says no, he has too much to do, but his mouth turns up a bit at the corner, and when Jesse gets up from the couch in the lounge to get another drink Gabe is leaning against the doorway with his own drink in hand, watching the movie. Or maybe watching them.

Two days later when he’s just brushed his teeth and is about to turn in for the night, there’s a knock on Jesse’s door. He opens it to find Gabe, dressed down in a faded Overwatch shirt and sweats. Jesse isn’t sure why he’s there, but he steps aside so Gabe can come in. He walks in, looking around curiously. He hasn’t been in here before.

Gabe stops in the darkened living room, the soft light from Jesse’s bedroom just beyond limning his profile. Jesse watches him from where he’s leaning up against the arm of the couch. He realizes that as much as he didn’t know how to approach things earlier, maybe Gabe doesn’t either.

“Can - ” Jesse starts, and then doesn’t know how to finish the sentence.

_Can you?_

_Can I?_

_Can we?_

_Can_ \- his brain is cut off by warm hands and a warmer mouth, his head tilted carefully to the best angle. Jesse closes his eyes and lets himself fall into the kiss. They haven’t kissed before, and as Gabe’s firm lips move over his, he can’t imagine why not.

It’s all hands and fabric and then just skin on skin, glowing warm in the dim lamplight. Jesse is pressed down into the bed, hands wrapped around his wrists that he knows could break the joints in mere seconds if wanted, but instead slide up and thread through Jesse’s own fingers. It’s so very much better than it was during his rut - now he’s aware enough to hear Gabe’s pants, to push his own hips back into Gabe’s, to wrap a hand around himself so Gabe can hold him with both hands and pull him back rough and then gentle, thrusts changing from moment to moment so Jesse never knows what’s coming next.

Afterwards when the sweat is cooling and Jesse’s running his hands absently through Gabe’s hair, he wonders if this is it. If they go anywhere from here.

-x-x-x-x-x-

Time keeps going on.

To Jesse’s surprise, so do they.

It’s not like they go out on dates, really, but their lives are centered on a black ops organization. Traditional dating isn’t really in the picture. They do spend more and more time together, though, and it’s not just for work or sex. Sometimes they just end up on the sinfully comfortable couches in Gabe’s quarters, each reading their own books. Other times Jesse gets stir crazy when he’s been in HQ for too long and drags Gabe out to a restaurant in Zürich or one of the neighboring towns, slamming back his first drink too fast with a grin so now Gabe has to drive them back.

He does, rolling his eyes but with a twitch at the corner of his lips.

Eventually a mission in northern Russia comes up and Jesse volunteers for it, to Gabe’s surprise. He pokes fun at Jesse’s normal hatred of the cold, right up until Genji’s request for heat leave that same week comes across his desk. They don’t talk about it, but that night Gabe rims Jesse ‘til he’s moaning incoherently then fucks him hard face to face, barely pulling his mouth away from Jesse’s long enough for him to breathe.

Genji meanwhile, finds it all amusing. “You could have just told me you are seeing someone,” he says afterwards with a smile in his tone. He leans forward and sniffs, Jesse tilting his chair back to unsubtly get away. “I can not tell who you are with though. Not anyone here. You are…” he trails off and pulls Jesse forward by the arm, disregarding propriety in favor of years of friendship and intimacy. “It is strange,” he says finally. “It is like… your scent is blended with something, but I cannot tell what that something is. Like if you were mixing paint, and one of the colors was - transparent.” He shakes his head and pulls back, adjusting his visor upwards to give Jesse a quizzical look. “You must tell me what scent masking soap you’re using, some day.”

“Yeah, soap,” Jesse stammers out after a moment. “That’s it.”

Despite the occasional awkwardness, it’s good. It really is.

The only thing, and it’s such a little thing, really, is that Gabe doesn’t knot him. Jesse’s fine with it, knows that some people only knot after marriage, some only when they really love the person - there’s a million reasons why he doesn't. It’s just...he thought they might be at that point. They’re spending most days in each others’ beds and they had the exclusivity talk awhile ago.  

Jesse just can’t help wondering why not, why not him, why not by now. It hurts, as much as he tells himself that it doesn’t matter.

-x-x-x-x-x-

Fucking Italy. Jesse has never had a good experience there.

This time? With Venice? He’s just going to avoid the whole damn country from now on.

He and Gabe...well. It’s not that they’re not talking, they speak at meetings and briefings. Technically. Sure, it’s abrupt enough with carefully selected barbed insults that leave the rest of the team looking everywhere but them, but it’s fine. And yes, Ana cornered him one day and gave him a blistering lecture about professionalism and something about how she knew this was all going to blow up in their faces eventually, which led to him snapping back and now he’s not really talking to Ana either, but it’s fine. Really, it is.

They sleep in their own beds every night, now. For the first time in the better part of a year they’re not spending most of their time together, and Jesse is disgusted at how it’s harder for him to wind down at night and sleep now. He rolls into the indent that Gabe’s body has made in his bed with a sigh, burying his face in the pillow and inhaling deeply. If you’d told Jesse a year ago he’d be able to pick that faint trace out of a crowd as easily as the strongest of pheromones he would have laughed and said no one’s nose was that good, but here he is with his face shoved in a pillow that long ago was labeled as Gabe’s, feeling sorry for himself.

It gets worse, in a strange way, as the days pass. At first he’s just lonely. Then he’s...unsettled. His coordination is off and Genji beats him in hand to hand even easier than usual. Genji stands over him, facemask tilted down at Jesse who is flat on his back and lacking any motivation to change his situation.

He crouches, pushing the visor up and looking at Jesse with worried red eyes. “I know that you are going through...whatever you are going through, but you seem more off than that would allow.” Jesse sighs and takes the proffered hand to haul him to his feet.

“I know. Been feelin’ out of sorts for a few days now, apart from the,” he waves his hand in the air. “You know.” At Genji’s pitying look he raises his hands in defeat. “Fine. If it gets much worse I’ll see the doc.”

It doesn’t feel like something he should see the doctor over, though, even as it just gets worse over the next day. He feels...itchy, under his skin. Not something he can scratch, but like a clothing seam that’s forever out of place but instead it’s in his muscles. He’s jumpy, snapping his head around at the slightest sound. He’s fine with Genji, with whom he trains the most, but when he works on hand-to-hand with Jeremiah, he finds himself getting strangely angry. Executing throws too hard, wanting to shove him through the training pad. The sparring match nearly turns into a real fight, before Ana happens by and breaks it up.

Jesse apologized to her days ago, and he’s been spending more time with her recently so as to avoid Gabe. He hasn’t actually seen Gabe around today, thankfully, but he’s still glad to have her as buffer.

“You look like hell, McCree,” she says bluntly. He rolls his eyes and huffs as he crosses his arms. She traces a gentle finger along his cheekbone, just below where he knows there are bags. “This is more than what happened between you and Gabriel. You’re too pale. Twitchy.” A hand to his jawline. “Clenching your teeth? I can hear them creaking.” He consciously relaxes his jaw, realizes how tight he was holding it. “Go to the medbay. Check in with someone.” At the look in his eyes, she clarifies. “Order, not request. Now, McCree.”

He knows better to argue, and makes his way to the medbay. He gets passed from doctor to doctor before ending up with Dr Ziegler. She seems to think its hormonal and asks a lot of questions - no, his rut is still a month away. No, he hasn’t had any contact with any alphas in rut or omegas in heat. When asked about sexual partners he’s silent for a minute, before saying quietly that he’s not currently seeing anyone.

“And your most recent relationship? How recent was it?”

“It ended not long ago. Bit over a week.”

“Mmmm. And when was his or her last heat?”

“He’s not an omega.”

She doesn’t raise so much as an eyebrow, bless her. “When was his last rut, then?”

“He doesn’t...I... It’s complicated.” She frowns. “Seriously, doc. It’s above your clearance levels to explain.”

She keeps frowning, but taps a thoughtful finger against her clipboard. “I’m going to send you to someone who’s been doing specific work with hormones, because I’m fairly sure that’s what’s causing this.” She hands him a piece of paper with ‘Lab G18B’ on it. He didn’t even know they had labs on the ground floor, but he shrugs and takes the paper.

Ten minutes later he steps cautiously into a lab he’s never seen before. “Hello?” he calls. Moira pokes her head out from around a corner.

“Nope.” Jesse turns and walks out.

She catches up to him halfway down the hallway. “Come now, Jesse. Angela sent you to me for a reason.”

“Not one I feel like talkin’ about with you.”

“Jesse.” She gets in front of him, holds him in place with spidery fingers on his shoulders. “I know we are not friends, but this is my speciality. I know you do not like me, nor I you for that matter, but do you trust me?”

Damn her. He didn’t trust her not to be making weird clones of all of them in some back room, but over the years he’d come to trust her as a teammate. To an extent. After a pause long enough to make his point, he rolls his eyes and walks back to the lab with her.

He sits on a table while Moira pokes and prods and takes his temperature - “High. Odd.” - and such, before she sits down and starts grilling him harder than Ziegler did.

When Jesse balks once more at discussing his previous relationship. Moira leans back in her chair. “You are aware that I was brought into Blackwatch for a reason? As a physician I expect my clearance level on matters such as this is higher than yours - it’s not like you are officially Gabriel’s second, after all.”

He must twitch or something at the name, because Moira’s mismatched eyes widen in delight. “Really? You and our illustrious commander? Well, then. That changes everything.” She stands and goes over to a screen hanging from the ceiling. A few touches, and there’s ringing for half a second before it cuts off. “We’re sorry, but the number you are calling - ”

“Medical override, Dr. Moira O'Deorain, ID 1258-89.” The ringing begins once more, before it stops, and a nigh-unrecognizable voice snarls out, “What.”

“I’m about to solve all your problems. Answer the door in a few minutes or you’ll be even more miserable, I promise you.” Her scarred right hand taps at the screen, ending the call. Moira hustles Jesse out of the room, and just a minute later he recognizes what direction they’re going in.

“Moira…”

“For once in your life close your mouth and don’t make this worse,” she says as they enter the hallway leading to Gabe’s quarters. She knocks briskly at the door and stands back. After a long, long moment the door opens. It’s dark inside, and the only thing Jesse can see is the light from the hallway gleaming off of Gabe’s eyes. Without bothering with greetings, Moira shoves Jesse into the room and pulls the door shut after him, calling out something about keeping track and letting her know how it goes.

Jesse isn’t paying attention to anything she says, because he’s in Gabe’s arms and…

And…

And it’s like everything is settled, like he’s submerged in a warm bath full of biotics. Gabe is warm - no, hot, so very hot in his arms, but it’s all right because Jesse’s felt like he’s been frozen inside for days.

Gabe’s face is in the hollow made by his collarbones, and his fingers are fumbling at the buttons on Jesse’s shirt. Jesse helps him get them undone, and Gabe practically plasters himself to Jesse once he can get his arms wrapped around skin. He’s burning up, and Jesse carefully walks them over to the bathroom. He turns just the shower light on before hitting the tap, making sure that it’s on cool. He undresses Gabe piece by piece, his clothes obvious slept in for several days and stiff with sweat. He gets his own clothing off quickly, letting Gabe lean against him as the water adjusts its temperature.

“I know we’ve been at sixes and sevens, darlin’, but if you’re going into rut you know you only have to call me,” he says quietly, rubbing a hand up Gabe’s spine and into the hair at the base of his neck.

“I’m not in rut.” Gabe stands, walks into the shower on steady legs.

Jesse follows, the door having been left open for him despite Gabe’s body language at the moment. He lets the spray dampen his hair down, combs through it with unsteady fingers. “If you’re not in rut, Gabe, I don’t get -”

Gabe glares halfheartedly at him from inches away, eyes tired over dark circles. He grabs Jesse’s hand, slides it around him until he’s cupping Gabe’s ass, fingers dipping into the cleft. “I’m not in _rut_ , Jesse.”

Jesse’s hand slides forward and there’s slickness there, slickness and warmth and oh holy god Gabe’s in _heat_.

He can’t help a curious finger pushing in just a bit. It goes into Gabe so easily he barely realizes he’s even done it until Gabe slides his eyes closed in relief. Jesse pulls his finger out, and as much as he wants to lick it clean he’s sure that if he does the whole point of taking a shower will be for nought.

“Okay, let’s get clean. Now.” Gabe cracks an annoyed eye open. “Both of us have been wallowing and I intend on puttin’ my mouth everywhere it can go, so give me the goddamn soap.” They clean up, Jesse putting the least effort into his hair possible but making sure his body is squeaky clean. All he wants to do is touch Gabe and get his hands all over the skin that he’s been missing for a week, but he knows that if he does he’ll end up fucking him here and that’ll be less than comfortable.

They dry off and make their way to the bedroom, unselfconscious in their nudity with each other. Gabe leans back up against the headboard, and Jesse doesn’t miss that the pillow he usually uses is on Gabe’s side. He sits on the edge of the bed.

“So. What brought all this on?”

“You.”

Jesse blinks. “Beg pardon?”

Gabe shrugs. “That’s what Moira thinks, in any event. I haven’t had…” he trails off, visibly trying to figure out how to phrase things. “Such a regular and long term relationship, particularly one with an alpha, in a very, very long time. Moira thinks that regular exposure to alpha pheromones somehow overcame or bypassed what SEP intended to do, and triggered me. And apparently you've been reacting to it, although without scent it wasn't obvious.” At Jesse's cocked eyebrow he elaborates: "Ana called earlier."

Well. That’s...something. “When was the last time you had a heat?” Jesse asks, curiously.

“During SEP and a few years after I would have these short little pseudoheats, just a day of feeling uncomfortable and itchy -” _I can relate_ , thought Jesse - “But a full heat? Not since, god, since I was twenty five.”

Damn. Two and a half decades, and Jesse is the one to finally mess him up. He shifts, guiltily. “I’m -”

“I swear to god if you say you’re sorry, I’ll throw you out the window,” interrupts Gabe. He catches Jesse’s gaze, holds it. “Do I wish I wasn’t going through this bullshit? Yes. But I wouldn’t trade it for you for anything.”

Jesse bites his lip so he doesn’t do something soppy like give the fond smile he wants to, and leans forward to kiss Gabe. It’s far gentler than the week full of arguments should allow for, and it ends quietly with their foreheads resting against each other.

“Let’s go to bed,” murmurs Gabe. “Heat’s not active yet, and I’ve been sleeping like shit.” He doesn’t say _without you_ but Jesse hears it anyways. They climb in on their usual sides. They’ve been together long enough that they don’t usually cuddle although Gabe often throws an arm across Jesse’s middle during the night. Tonight, though, Jesse curls up against Gabe, one arm tucked between them and the other wrapped across a wide chest. Gabe’s broad, clever fingers detangle Jesse’s hair the way he should have in the shower. They’re going to have to talk about Venice and their argument at some point, but not now. Jesse lets his eyes close.

-x-x-x-x-x-

There’s warm wetness around his cock, and Jesse can’t help but lazily push up into it. He opens bleary eyes to the beautiful sight of Gabriel Reyes swallowing him down. Jesse groans, reaching a hand down to cup Gabe’s cheek.

“Stop that,” Gabe growls out. “Concentrate on getting hard enough to fuck me.”

“Not gonna be a problem if you keep doin’ just that, darlin’,” Jesse breathes out. Less than a minute later Gabe is apparently happy, because he sits up, letting Jesse’s cock slide out of his mouth, wiping away spit and precome from his beard.

Jesse moves to get up, but he’s pressed back onto the bed by the force of Gabe’s glare, reinforced by a “Lay the fuck back down.” Jesse obeys, and Gabe throws a leg over to straddle him. By now, Jesse can smell the heat in the air. It’s not pheromones, but it’s a mixture of Gabe’s usual scent and tangy sweat and something unfamiliar and sweet-sour that Jesse realizes has to be his slick. Gabe positions himself over Jesse, and without warning slides down.

It’s...it’s nothing that Jesse has felt before. He’s fucked omegas, even omegas in heat. Gabe is nothing like any of them. He’s unbelievably tight, even with the looseness that heat provides. His slick is better than any lube, making the slide perfect and wet. Gabe shifts around, until he’s in a position to his liking - hands braced back on Jesse’s shins, back arched. Jesse can’t do anything but just lie there as Gabe slams his hips down over and over, wrenching the pleasure from Jesse like it’s an interrogation technique. He’s gorgeous like this, muscles working like a well oiled machine, and Jesse doesn’t do anything other than stare up at him and wonder how he caught this beautiful, dangerous man.

Jesse may be the alpha, he may be the one penetrating, but he has no question about how he’s the one getting fucked here.

Gabe reaches one of his hands underneath himself, brings his fingers out all glossy with slick. His hips keep moving as he shifts forward and shoves his fingers in Jesse’s mouth. “Knot me,” he murmurs as Jesse swallows, and oh god - there, there’s the pheromones that he’s never been able to smell, that have kept him from fully joining Gabe in the heat.

Hands that have been laying dumbly by his sides move up to grab Gabe’s knife-edge hipbones, pulling him down and pushing him up in rhythm with Gabe. He feels himself getting close, feels his knot bulging at the base of his dick. Jesse takes a hand off of Gabe’s hip, reaches up to pull Gabe down into a kiss that’s more tongue and teeth than anything. They both groan as Jesse’s hips jerk up involuntarily, knot filling and pushing into Gabe in a single movement. Gabe locks down onto his cock and he sighs quietly as he starts to contract slowly and rhythmically around Jesse.

They lay like that for a full minute, Jesse dazed from the bliss of knotting Gabe and filling him up. Before long there’s a hard tap to his side. “Wake up and get me off,” Gabe mutters.

Jesse smiles and can’t keep himself from pressing a kiss to the side of Gabe’s head. He jacks Gabe off slowly, Gabe making soft noises in the back of his throat that Jesse’s never heard from him before. His hand speeds up, getting tighter, faster, until Gabe finally comes with a groan, back arching as he covers Jesse’s stomach and chest with sticky white. He lowers himself on less than steady arms down to Jesse’s chest, heedless of the mess between them.

Some time later - ten minutes, half an hour, Jesse’s lost track of time completely - there’s the knock of something cold and metallic against his arm.

“Hold this.”

Jesse focuses his eyes, then tries to focus again because he could swear that’s a tablet dangling in front of him but he thought they were in the middle of sex - “What?”

Gabe sighs from where he’s seated on top of him, still firmly tied on. “I’ve got messages to send, it’s not like I planned for this. And this is likely the clearest my head will be for the next few days, so if you don’t want Blackwatch to fall down around our ears while we’re fucking, hold this.”

Jesse grumpily holds the tablet in front of him as Gabe taps away, seemingly as content as if he was sitting at the desk in his office instead of on Jesse’s dick. Jesse gets bored after a few minutes, starts to stealthily shift his hips up and down. There’s a tightening of Gabe’s thighs, a warning in the thick muscles that says he’s kicked Jesse’s ass in hand to hand combat for most of a decade now so maybe he shouldn’t test things.

“Unless you want to starve, hang tight for a few minutes. I’m arranging food deliveries.” Jesse rolls his eyes but stills, knowing it’s necessary. Eventually Gabe shuts the tablet down, setting it on the side table. He looks down at Jesse, hands that he watched break necks a week ago gentle on his face. “I missed you.”

Jesse bites back a smile as Gabe makes a face at himself, no doubt annoyed at the hormones that are making him more emotionally open than usual. “Me too,” he says quietly, honestly. Jesse can feel his knot deflating so he pulls Gabe down to him and flips them over, some primitive, deep-rooted alpha behavior rising to the surface to make it so his seed will stay in his mate. Jesse rolls his eyes mentally as he pulls out, but is satisfied deep down when there’s just the barest trickle of white that spills out of Gabe. He can’t help but reach down and rub it into the skin, to dance his fingers around where wrinkles have pouted out into smooth, swollen skin.

Gabe bats his hand away, murmuring to stop that as he nestles close to Jesse. Jesse wraps his arms around, feeling weirdly nervous.

“Are we gonna talk about it? Venice, I mean. And us,” he gets out, eventually.

“No.” Jesse’s stomach drops before Gabe shakes his head at himself. “I mean, yes, Jesse, we’re going to - but not right now when my brain isn’t going to be functional for the next few days and you won’t be much better.” He holds Jesse’s chin in a firm hand and makes him meet his eyes, smiling that just barely there smile that belongs to Jesse, belongs to _them_. “I think the past week proves that, that we’re more than a stupid argument. That we’re something worth having.” He settles back down, nose pressed into Jesse’s throat. “I went into heat for you, kid. Means something.” 

It’s not an _I love you_ , but this is Gabe and Jesse. They’re not exactly  the best at verbal communication. Jesse settles back down, hand tracing up and down the familiar muscles of Gabe’s back. Venice was bad, but it’s just a blip. They can recover from it. They’re Gabe and Jesse - they’re Blackwatch. They do what they have to, they always survive. Somehow.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading, come yell with/at me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/thereweregiants)


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